Hans-Joachim Marseille (Marseille)

Marseille, Hans-Joachim (Marseille), ( "Jochen") (1919-1942), Luftwaffe fighter pilot, one of the most famous pilots of the Third Reich. Born December 13, 1919 in the Berlin suburb of Charlottenburg in the family of the descendants of the French Lutherans. His father, Siegfried Marseille was a pilot during the 1-st World War and then became a policeman, in 1944 with the rank of Major General Wehrmacht he died on the Eastern Front. Hardly Marcel was 18, he went to serve in the Luftwaffe, where he showed himself a talented, but very undisciplined pilot, which women were interested in far more than military training. During the "Battle of Britain" Maurice shot down 7 enemy planes, and most of his shot down at least 4 times, but he always managed to hang on his plane to the coast of France.

In full flight of his talent and sniper opened in North. Africa, where Marcel was sent to the 27 th fighter air group, Major Edmund Naumann to support the army of General Erwin Rommel and where flew Me-109. He has received many top awards, including Hitler personally awarded him the Knights Cross with Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds. Mussolini's Italy awarded him the Gold Medal for bravery.

After Rommel Marseille was the most popular figure in the North African campaign. When Sept. 1, 1942 he was one day destroyed 17 British aircraft, the Germans breathless press called him the African Eagle and the Star of the Desert.
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. September 30, 1942, when Marcel was returning from missions over Cairo, the cabin of his plane suddenly filled with acrid black smoke
. Already out of breath, he managed to hang on to the location and Germanic troops near El Alamein jumped from the plane with a parachute. In the eyes of his comrades Marcel prolong the air stream of the incident aircraft and violently struck on the tail plating. His parachute never opened.

Total Marcel made 388 sorties and shot down 158 enemy aircraft, which provided him 31 th place in the list of Germanic aces. He was killed when he still was not even 23 years.